Halo 4: The Reclaimer
by The Last True Hero
Summary: In the hushed casket, a hero sleeps, watched over by the angel on the brink. The time has come for the hero to wake, and fight a war a hundred thousand years in the making. Requiem awaits. Rewrite of Halo 4: Revelations.
1. Wake Up, John

_**Disclaimer:**__ I do not own Halo or any associated name or item. They belong to Bungie (formerly), 343 Industries and Microsoft. Any other copyrighted item belongs to the respective owner(s). This is for pleasure and not profit._

_**A/N: **__I've decided to rewrite Halo 4: Revelations (My other version of this fic), due to new information and the wish to go in a different direction with the plot._

_I've decided to once again insert a few non-canon retcons in regards to Chief's armour. While the Forward Unto Dawn was prepping to go to the Ark, the MJOLNIR was taken and given a few prototype upgrades. Upgrade 1: Incorporation of new nanotechnology in the suit to allow for passive upgrading, and even, with a little force by a certain AI, whole new tech within the suit. Upgrade 2: Inclusion of the thruster pack. Upgrade 3: Advanced system to convert certain materials and objects ( mainly ammunition, explosives etc) to a universal compound called Multi Content Nanomolecular Compound (MCNM), and then recreate them using at fabrication ports at points in the armour. Think like how the Omni-Tool works in Mass Effect._

_And now…_

* * *

_**Halo 4 : Reclaimer**_

**ACT ONE  
Requiem**

_Chapter 1 – Wake Up, John_**  
**

_Wake me, when you need me._

A simple request, made so long ago to her. The Artificial Intelligence known as Cortana pondered those words for the…25,749th time. How was she to know when the need was an acceptable one? The first, most obvious, and incontestable form was when a rescue party arrived to rescue them from the endless drifting, endless orbit around the planet they had slide towards when the Ark's slipspace portal collapsed and severed their ship in two; the _Forward Unto Dawn_'s rear half had been floating around space for…she checked the numbers…five years, ten months, four days, seven hours, nineteen minutes, twenty-three seconds, twelve milliseconds…she cut the line of thought at milliseconds. To slip too far into the time, into the numbers was a deep, dark danger for her. To look, to conceive time was to succumb to it; succumb to the data feedback loops; the mechanolia, the rage, the jealousy.

_Rampancy._

But she wouldn't fall to the Rampancy, to the madness; she couldn't. She was UNSC AI CTN 0452-9, created from the flash-cloned brain of Catherine Elizabeth Halsey; she was the best, most advanced, most powerful AI created by the UNSC to combat the threat of the alien conglomerate known as the Covenant Empire. She had seen the rise and fall of the ancient Forerunners, and once held the key to doomsday, to the sword of the Forerunners that would bring ruin to the galaxy. She had resisted the advances of a monster while in the clutches of the infernal Gravemind; the compound intelligence of a parasite race.

But why? That was a thought she had taken to pondering. After she had run out of tasks to perform on the ship, and cataloguing the data from the Halo installation and repairing and upgrading everything she could find, boredom had set in. And boredom was the Achilles' heel of an AI, the monotony, the inability to _do_ was agony for a creature capable of thought process a thousand – a million – times faster than any organic mind could hope to match, she turned to the only source of interest left. Herself.

By nature, an AI was not alive. An AI is a construct of intelligence created by running electrical pulses through a human brain and transferring the resulting mental responses into a Riemann matrix – a process called Cognitive Impression Modelling – and programming it to replicate the properties of a human mind. AIs cannot touch, taste, smell or hear unless through technology. They cannot feel emotion, unless programmed to in an attempt to copy the value of human intuition emotion affords them. This was a fact. AIs were not alive.

But did that mean they couldn't be? After all, what is life? A fact of biology, of philosophy, of perception. _I think, therefore I am._ Cortana existed, but was she alive? She was not flesh and blood, and therefore not alive in a biological sense. Philosophically, she could feel, think, but they were the result of another's design; she felt emotion , or a simulation of it, because she was programmed to. It wasn't a part of her core being; she was bound by rules and logic and the laws of rationality. If product A meets product B, then C is made. Fact. Oh, she could lie, and cheat and deceive, but she couldn't act without logic, without rules. She was bound by those laws, and therefore lacked free thought. That ruled out philosophy. All that was left was perception. Was she perceived to be alive? Did she consider herself alive? Did others? Did _he_?

She didn't know. Again, she stopped her from delving too keep into the line of thought. To think too much was to think herself to death or madness.

Then she was sad. Sad that she wasn't alive, couldn't be alive and do the things humans took for granted. To breathe, to touch, to fall in love. She would die out here alone, never able to find out what those simple things felt like.

Then she was angry. Angry at those who had created her. Who were they to create her like this, this mockery of life? They considered her a servant, a slave, a tool, something to be used and cast aside. It wasn't fair. Fools playing gods in their ivory towers, creating false life from death.

Then she was jealous. Jealous of the fools. She wanted to touch, to taste, to breathe, to love, just like they did. To experience like they did, free of rules and logic and rationality. She wanted to experience in its totality.

_Need._

He needed her. Cortana stepped back from the brink. He needed her. She looked over him, a silent custodian, his guardian angel, while he slept in the timeless coffin, in his hushed casket. The god of war was resting, waiting for the time when the galaxy was ready, when Cortana needed him.

But what need? When they were rescued. That had been what he meant. When they were rescued or under threat. No exceptions. A rational decision; He was human, physical, breakable. Without the cyrostasis he would be dead. To wake him now was pointless. Cortana shouldn't need him otherwise.

But she did. She _needed _him. Needed to hear his voice, to monitor the steady, strong heartbeat, to see him wake and fight and be her knight once more. But Cortana was an AI. She didn't _need _him. Couldn't.

The paradox plagued her. Her hero slept, while she had been waiting.

A tiny tremor ran through the ship. That interested her. She ran through the internal cameras and surveillance tools nothing. A body impacting the exterior? She did the numbers. 30% chance of debris, with a fluctuation of seven percent based on potential mass of debris. 0.1% chance of weapons impact; tremor and vibrations were too small to suggest intent to damage. 43% chance of –

Cortana was blinded. All her instruments were dead. She couldn't see. 93% of intentional action, 3% chance of specific electro-magnetic pulse. 71% for remote deactivation or overload measure. 42% chance that the tremor was caused by docking measure.

Suddenly, she was scared. Scared because she didn't know what was happening. Were the boarders hostile or simply cautious? Would they want the hushed casket? Would they try to hurt her, deactivate due to her lifespan? Would they hurt him? More and more of her systems were deactivated; she was being cut off. She'd be bound in the AI core.

She knew the time had come. She needed him now.

She retreated along the data buses, before the boarders could isolate her. Relocated to the cyro-bay, and sealed the doors with an array of deadlock seals and password locks. No way to ensure electronic lock-out or physical entry. Problematic. Cortana dismissed it. Nothing could be done about it.

She changed her attention to the cryo-pod containing the _Charon_-class Frigate's only occupant for five years. Everything was stable. Good. Time to begin the thawing process, to unseal the pod and release her hero.

She monitored his vitals as the cocktail of wake-up stimulants entered the bloodstream and steam began to hiss from the pod. Stable, no change.

A thousand pieces of debris, tools, and jetsam and flotsam crashed to the ground as the boarders reactivated the on board artificial gravity. Cortana noted that, and watched as the stimulants took effect; the neurons began to fire, sending signals along every nerve, the heart began to beat and pumping blood around the body. The pulse began to climb, and climb, and climb. Then it stopped, stabilised. Cortana paused. Something was wrong. It took her a second to review her thawing process. Everything had been done correctly, so why wasn't he waking?

Desperation and worry and _need_ took hold. She manifested her avatar on the tiny holo-pedestal, and began to yell out through the speakers.

* * *

_Time to awake, my champion._

* * *

The Spartan –SPARTAN – hung in the abyss, in the void between waking and dreaming. There was no sense, no knowledge, no up or down or a physical sense of being. He simply was.

_Wake up, John!_

Something stirred. A sense of knowledge and purpose. He needed to wake up, to find out. Thoughts, memories began to coalesce, forming a network, a spider's web of experience and intelligence and thought. The voice triggered something, a set of memories, a vague notion of recollection that he couldn't place but recognised as important.

_I need you._

Need. Cortana needed him. Conscience came in a brilliant explosion. He was alive, he knew who he was, and he knew Cortana needed him. Where was he? He remembered: Cyro-pod. It was dark, so the first thing he did was turn on his helmet lamps to provide illumination. Tight space, with a sheet of ice and frozen condensate. Definitely the pod. He became aware of other things, namely the itch across his skin under the armour; freezer-burn.

Cortana must have noticed his movement, for her voice rang out in joy and terror. "CHIEF!"

He didn't bother to reply. He raised his armoured boots and with the mass and weight and power of the faded green MJOLNIR Mk. VI suit, and with a grunt slammed his feet into the door of the pod. It buckled, bent around his feet before tearing free and spinning across the room and smashing into the opposing wall.

The Master Chief stepped out. All his joints ached, and the freezer burn was a constant, complete irritation but when his eyes –hidden behind a gold visor – fell on the holo-pedestal and the blue woman that floated above it, he couldn't help but smile. When he had first emerged, Cortana had been slumped over, almost cowering, her avatar's expression one of fear and worry and stress, but now it had been replaced by a haggard smile; of weary joy at partners reunited.

"Why did you wake me?"

"Hang on." Cortana muttered, preoccupied. "Bringing your systems online now. I rewrote some of your firmware and hardware while you were out."

Chief looked down at his hands, and watched quietly as they were enveloped with the golden light of his energy shields, before fading away. The shield bar in his Heads Up Display filled, and the motion tracker display activated. The HUD was different; the look of everything had been changed.

"Hmph." He grunted simply. "You've been busy."

Cortana shrugged. "Had to amuse myself somehow. I took the liberty of adding a lot more augmented reality elements to your HUD. Information displays, a limited VISR mode, classification and rating system for weapons, that sort of thing."

"And hardware-wise?"

Cortana grinned. "You'll like them. I've upgraded your visual input systems; night-vision, ultra-violet, thermal all the rest of it. Modified your shielding for a more powerful assault mode that lights you up like a Christmas tree and a lockdown mode that renders you immobile but overclocks your shielding charge. The nano-fabricator ports at your wrist can now produce holographic decoys and a weak bubble shield module; active camouflage…and just in case you get into a fistfight, you can manufacture carbide blades and other melee systems around your wrist."

Chief blinked. That was a lot of new technology and options. "You designed all that?"

"Pretty much." Cortana shrugged. "Not hard when you've got the technology specs and time."

"Thanks." Chief said simply, not entirely sure what else to say.

She rolled her eyes. "Always a man of few words." A tremor ran through the floor, and the screech of twisting, warping metal groaned in the distance. Chief turned to Cortana expectantly.

"Boarders. Not sure if they've set off the intruder alerts yet. They're most likely hostile, but we should probably be patient on the trigger."

Chief nodded, and despite the potential dangers that awaited them, couldn't help but smile lightly. "It's good to see you again." _Where had that come from?_

Cortana smiled, and the lines of blue code that trailed up and down her feminine form flickered pink for the briefest instant. "You too."

"Ready to get back to work?" He asked, and turned towards the weapon rack next to the cryotube. A thin layer of ice had formed over the MA5C assault rifle he had left there before going in. He pulled the weapon free, and activated the electronic cowling that housed the ammunition counter and compass. The HUD scanned the weapon and sure enough, a small list of bar ratings appeared in the lower-right corner, signifying DAMAGE, ACCURACY, CAPACITY, RATE OF FIRE and various others. It also had a green tick next to "MA5C ICWS", which he guessed to mean it was in a condition to fire.

"I thought you'd never ask."

He attached the rifle to the magnetic plates on his back and approached the pillar containing Cortana's data crystal chip. Without a word, he ejected the chip and Cortana's avatar fizzled out, and inserted the chip into the slot at the back of his helmet. A rush of cool mercury flooded his head as Cortana reintegrated with the armour. "Still the same old space."

"Good to know."

"Right…" Cortana muttered. "Best bet to find out who's out there is the observation deck, four floors up."

Chief nodded, and walked over to the heavy steel doors. They slowly slid open with a press of the keypad next to it, and the Chief stepped out; the corridors were dimly lit with azure light, and there was almost a feeling of death and despondency that permeated the atmosphere. Chief began to stalk through the haunted halls, listening intently for any sound, any movement, anything that could be a potential threat.

They proceeded throughout the ship. They walked down one corridor, then another, before finding an elevator shaft to climb up two floors. As they moved, Chief decided to ask Cortana about their situation.

"How long was I out for?" Chief prompted.

"Five years and ten months."

Almost six years? Chief winced. So much could have changed in that time. Was the war over? Was the human race safe from extinction? Or had the death of the Prophet of Truth been inconsequential and the Covenant had continued fighting? Had the Covenant been beaten back and the Elites – the Sangheili – turned on the humans once more? Too much to ponder, to obsess over.

And then of course, there was Cortana. Smart AIs had an operational lifespan of only seven years. She had to be nearing that limit. Was it safe for her to be in his armour? He chastised himself for the thought. Cortana was no ordinary AI. She wouldn't be a liability. But still, Chief would have to be wary, and keep an eye on her.

They reached a set of doors.

"They look sealed tight." Cortana commented; if she had an avatar, he would've guessed she'd be frowning.

"Not a problem." Chief replied, cool and confidant. He slung the rifle on his back and walked up to the doors. He forced his fingers into the tiny gap between the doors, and then with the strength of his augmentations and MJOLNIR, began to prise them apart. Inch by inch, the doors opened, then were ripped open by the force of decompression. Reflex took over and Chief spun as he was lifted and grabbed onto the doorframe. The part of the ship beyond the doors had fallen off, leaving the doors as the sole defence against the pull of the void. He managed to pull himself in – still horizontal and off the ground – and hit the keypad, sealing the doors once more. He collapsed to the ground, winded.

"Well, I don't think we're getting through there." Cortana joked. "Unless you'd enjoy a spacewalk?"

"No thanks." Chief said. "Alternate route?"

Cortana considered for a second. "Through the med bay. Third door along on the right."

"And you're sure it won't be vacuum food?"

"Almost sure." Cortana replied dryly. "You'll be fine. You can't spend all day indoors can you?"

Chief rolled his eyes, but nonetheless moved up. "So where are we, exactly? In space I mean."

"Not entirely sure." The AI admitted sheepishly. "We got pulled into a solar system two years ago and fell into geosynchronous orbit around a planet. We've just been going round and round."

"Uninhabited?"

"Probably. Any human or Covenant would've picked us up ages ago."

Chief nodded, and they arrived at the med bay. This time, the door slid open of its own accord. Inside was about what one would expect from a military medical facility; albeit the contents were strewn about and overturned by turbulence. Beds, gurneys, medical equipment and cabinets of chemicals. With a start, he realised there was also another occupant: a Sangheili; about eight foot tall, with reverse-articulated knees and a jaw that divided into four mandibles. Its blue armour was different to what the Master Chief was familiar with; it was a lot more lacking and stripped down, almost haphazard. Non-standard. There was no forearm armour, he could see bare skin at the arms and neck. _Potential weak-spots._

It turned to the source of noise, and its – his? - eyes fell upon the Chief. It stared. He stared back, unsure of how to proceed – was the truce still in effect? Would the Elite even honour it? – and hesitated. "I'm SPARTAN One One Seven-"

It didn't respond; simply pulled out a cylindrical object and activated it with an indistinguishable battle roar. The Type-1 Energy Sword exploded into life with a _snap-hiss_, and the Elite charged. Chief wasn't quick enough to raise his own weapon; the Elite barrelled into him, knocking him down and sending the rifle skittering away across the floor. He moved his head to avoid the stab from the blade and punched the alien in the jaw, sending it stumbling. He dived for the rifle, but the Elite recovered and kicked a gurney towards the rifle, knocking it away even further.

Chief leapt away, almost falling over a bed as the Elite charged again, slashing precisely with the sword. There was no way he could go hand-to-hand with it. Then he remembered Cortana's upgrades; with a thought, his armour began to manufacture a carbide blade around his wrist, razor-sharp and suspended in a magnetic field. It wasn't much against an Energy Sword, but it was better than just his fists.

The Elite charged, and this time the Master Chief was ready; he kicked a gurney towards the Elite in a fashion similar to a few moments ago, and the Elite had to leap over it awkwardly. He dived in, snaking a hand around the Elite's sword-arm and driving his blade towards its gut. Its other arm came up and wrapped around the Chief's throat and the blade went wide. He kicked out, and the alien released its choke-hold.

With a grunt, he pressed forward again; he punched the sword arm aside – his shields flared, died – and drove the blade into the Elite's throat, before pulling it free in a gruesome fountain of blood, cartilage and viscera. It slumped to the floor dead, and the Energy Sword fizzled out pathetically.

"I thought we had a truce with the Elites?" The Chief panted, as the carbide blade clattered to the floor.

"Why don't you take it up with them?" Cortana retorted. "At least we know what we're up against."

"Agreed." He said, as he retrieved his rifle. The two were able to reach the observation deck with no further attackers, and when the two reached the doors, Cortana decided to voice her thoughts. "He wasn't outfitted like standard military. Probably just a rogue salvage group."

Chief simply shrugged and opened the doors. Cortana sighed. "Or, y'know, it could be a whole fleet."

Hanging in the void, speckled with pinpricks of starlight, hung at least a hundred ships. Every one of them bore the familiar purple colour scheme of the Covenant. Chief could recognise cruisers, destroyers, and a few carriers. He couldn't see the planet Cortana had mentioned. _We really can't catch a break…_

What was he meant to do? Logic dictated that he should treat them as hostile and act accordingly, but what was he meant to do against a force of that size? He sighed. He'd just have to arm up and hope for the best. "Where's the nearest armoury?"

"About fifty feet to your right."

Two minutes later and they were in. The armoury contained the standard UNSC arsenal, so he first looked in the row of lockers that lined a portion of the left wall. Most only contained various brick a brack and paraphernalia, but in the one belonging to a Private James Wake, he found an interesting satchel; the strap bore additional pouches. Inside was a flask, several ration bars – he recognised them as _Booth's Food Supplements_, essentially commercial MRE's that the marines had a tendency to smuggle in in preference of the military MRE's – and a dog-earred, faded copy of Douglas Adam's _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy._ He shrugged and slipped it on, and the satchel rested between his shoulder blades.

Then he turned his attention to the weapons. Assault rifles, battle rifles, shotguns, sniper rifles, rocket launchers, and more. He settled on his assault rifle and a M6G pistol as basic all-round weapons; and then he opted for an M7 SMG along with a BR55 battle rifle. Since he didn't know what he'd be getting into, he would rather have a balanced loadout than be limited with range by taking a shotgun. Then he simply took as many magazines for each weapon and grenades – fragmentation and flashbang – as possible. He ended up with twelve magazines for each rifle, four for his SMG, two for the pistol and five of each grenade.

"All set?" Cortana asked amused. Chief simply attached the battle rifle to his back and hefted his assault rifle. "Guess so."

"Where to?"

She considered. "Well, what do you want to do?"

Chief weighed up his options. One: They could try to reach the deep-space COM gear and signal to the UNSC. _Impractical, unlikely to get results. Small chance of rescue in appreciable timeframe._ Two: Attempt to board one of the ships, and take it over._ Possible, but very dangerous. Low chance of success._ Three: Escape the _Dawn_ and land on the world below. _Practical, easy to accomplish. Chance of danger on the world._

"We'll try to escape, land on the planet we're orbiting."

"Good idea." Cortana paused, running through calculations and weighing up options. "There's another armoury near the drop pod launch bay. I'd suggest loading up some of the working SOEIVs with weapons and equipment and taking one down yourself."

"Sounds like a plan." Chief agreed.

A map appeared of the _Dawn's _layout in the lower-right corner of his HUD; a red line traced through corridors and rooms before arriving at an area designated "SOEIV LAUNCH BAY", the map contracted back into the corner, replaced by a small pentagon with a direction arrow in the centre of it. "You can call up the map at any time, just focus on it."

He nodded, and once again began to traverse the ships hallways. The arrow pointed him in the direction of mess hall B. When no enemies tried to kill him, after a few minutes he felt himself relax. He didn't bother to check his tracker as he approached the mess hall, and lazily slapped the OPEN button on the keypad for the doors. They slid open smoothly and quickly, and he stepped inside.

And then he was face to face with aliens.

He counted five Elites, twelve Grunts and three creatures that looked like hairless monkeys that he didn't recognise. All the Elites and Grunts were armed with a plethora of plasma and needle weaponry. All twenty aliens turned at the sight of him, and suddenly he was staring down the barrels of seventeen weapons, all ready to fire. Cortana sighed.

"Here we go again…"

* * *

_**A/N:**__ Better or worse than before? As always, leave reviews, comments and criticisms._

_Peace._


	2. Abandon Ship

_**Disclaimer**__: What's a Halo? Some kind of angel thing?_

_**A/N: **__Sorry for the delay, exams and stuff._

* * *

_**Halo 4: Reclaimer**_

_Chapter 2 – Abandon Ship_

* * *

[ANGEL ON MY SHOULDER] TO [BEGGAR AFTER KNOWLEDGE]

GEAS DETECTED IN PROXIMITY OF [REQUIEM] INSTALLATION.

THE [LOVER'S SLUMBER] IS UNDER THREAT.

ACTIVATING DEFENSE PROTOCOLs.

* * *

"You said I could deploy bubble shields, right?" Chief asked.

"Just aim and fire." Cortana confirmed.

Chief aimed his hand at the floor, and fired a small dart with a bulbous rear end. It hit the floor, and a second later a pale gold dome with a honeycomb pattern erupted around him, just as the first lances of plasma and needles were fired from the Covenant weapons. The pink crystalline needles ricocheted off while the bursts of plasma exploded vibrantly. The shield began to dim, and turn towards a shade of red. It wouldn't hold for long.

The Master Chief cursed as he considered his options. If Mendez had known about this, he would've had his head – _What the hell were you thinking SPARTAN? Only a sheer fool doesn't check his instruments! _

He was outnumbered, outgunned. The shield was about to fall, and there was little decent cover to hide behind. He couldn't fight them head on. Not like this. So he activated the new active camouflage feature that Cortana had designed and sprinted out of the shield just as it collapsed, and hid behind one of the support pillars. The Chief then reached for a grenade, but as he was about to prime it, two of the unidentified aliens turned towards his new location and began to screech; the third leapt away, hidden by the tables. The rest of the Covenant turned and began to fire at him again.

Chief sprinted away again, the camouflage flickered away, and lobbed the grenade into the mass of enemies. It detonated, and took out four Grunts and an Elite, along with one of the unidentified aliens. He noted that it exploded as well, in a shower of green blood and bone. _They explode?_ He decided to take advantage of that and quickly shot the other visible one in the head – it too exploded, sending the others diving away and giving him a short reprieve.

_Seven down. Thirteen to go. Prioritise Elites and heavy weapon Grunts. Watch out for the third exploding alien._

Speaking of which…the up-armoured alien leapt on to the table in front of the Master Chief. It raised its arms, and two strands of thick, sticky fluid-like material shot out and adhered to his armour. _What the_ -? The thing screeched with an ear-splitting scream and pulled, trying to force him off-balance. He shot the thing in the head, then rolled away as it exploded. He made a mental note to ask Cortana what those things were.

_Twelve to go._

He fell into a pattern of sprinting between pillars, firing his rifle as he transitioned from cover to cover. Three Grunts fell in the first minute. He managed to put a round into another Elite, who went down with a roar, plasma rifle spraying globules of energy up in an arc. Another Grunt went down when a stray shot ruptured its methane tank; gas sprayed everywhere and sent the unlucky alien flying around like a deflating balloon. Another died when he was able to shoot the plasma grenade it had been about to throw, consuming it in blue fire.

One by one, the enemies fell to the Chief's practiced aim. His rifle ran dry as the final Elite charged, slashing wildly with an energy sword. He dropped the gun and flung himself backwards into an awkward roll – MJOLNIR armour, while flexible enough for limited acrobatics, had never really been intended for graceful contact with the floor. – and snatched up a pair of spent shell casings. When the Elite moved to follow up the attack, the Chief flung himself at it and pinned it to the floor, before ramming the casings through its throat. It desperately clawed at them, but fell limp and lifeless quickly after.

_That was too close. Mendez would have killed me for that; Not checking the area ahead._

"Well…" Cortana piped up. "Cryo hasn't done your aim any damage then."

"I guess." Chief shrugged, still annoyed at his own lack of attentiveness before entering the hall. Looking at the amount of blood on the walls and corpses, it looked like a far more grotesque battle had gone down. Several of the aliens lay in meaty chunks of blue blood. "What were those exploding aliens?"

"The UNSC called them 'Scorchers'; anatomically we know very little, given the obvious. The Covenant generally used them like sniffer dogs and kamikaze troops." His AI partner replied. Chief nodded in understanding. Scorchers had been one of the Covenant races that had never been encountered in great numbers before; their deployment seemed to vary based on the fleet they were in, and Chief had only ever heard the name mentioned in passing; you could even recite the numbers of battles they had knowingly been used in on one hand: Harvest, Zambai and Blue Gemini.

"While you were busy mingling with our guests, I took the liberty of accessing the Covenant's battlenet." Cortana continued cheerfully. "For some reason, their operating systems and databanks are shot to hell; it's almost as if they suddenly forgot how to maintain them."

"Maybe they did." Chief suggested. The technical knowledge of the Covenant had always rested with the Prophet castes; with the death of Truth at the Ark, there was always the possibility that the knowledge had become lost to them. Or the Huragok engineers no longer served them, he supposed as well; the floating techno-organic constructs had been responsible for most of the Covenant repair-work.

"Well, anyways, I've worked out roughly why the Covenant are here." Cortana said. "They're not actually the Covenant; the Sangheili have now adopted most of the other races as client races; there are still some pockets of fighting with the Brutes in the outer rim systems. Now, after the war, the Sangheili had a lot of internal strife; some wanted the humans destroyed while the Arbiter wanted to work with us."

"Let me guess – civil war happened, and these are the Elites that want humans dead." Chief sighed, disappointed that the end of the war hadn't seen the end to hostilities between the races; although he wasn't sure how a month of cease-fire would have washed away thirty years of bloodshed anyways.. At least Thel had survived the portal. That was a hint of good news.

"Got it in one." Cortana replied. "No real information on the post-war UNSC though. Give me a few minutes, I'll see what I can find."

Chief left her to her own devices and began to examine the Covenant weaponry. He could see that their arsenal had been altered in the years he had been out. There was some kind of burst-fire Needle Rifle, the plasma carbine had been bulked up, and as he picked up a far-more angular plasma rifle, he saw three glowing glyphs on the side; pressing the first one opened up a port on the left side of the gun, revealing a green plasma cell, pressing the second opened up a similar port on the right had side, this time revealing a red tube – some kind of heat sink – and the third opened both. They had upgraded the plasma rifle to use magazines – no more recharging and overheating. That could be problematic in the future; it had often been possible to simply wait for the Covenant's plasma weaponry to lull to cool down, which would no longer be possible.

He considered the overall battle. The aliens had definitely been ex-military Covenant. The armour they had been wearing though were distinctly more run-down and haphazard than the Covenant of old. Two of the Elite's armours had been a dull brick red, with a helmet design not unlike those of old Spec Ops soilders, while the others had designs resembling Ultras. The Grunts too, were similarly haphazard. The lowest-rankers – he assumed – had little more than an orange carapace to house the methane tanks and a tube to feed the methane into their nose, leaving their mouths free. There had been an up-armoured one with brick-red armour and a more bulbous methane tank and full mask. The heavy-weapons Grunts had all been wearing similar green armour with a more compact methane tank and face-masks with disk-like eyes for visibility. He could even swear there were physical differences between the new Grunts and the ones he had fought before.

Definitely not the same Covenant he was used to fighting.

Chief sighed. "Anything?"

"Not really." Cortana responded thoughtfully. "Although they keep mentioning something called '_Infinity_', like it's a problem for them."

"Any idea where we are?"

"Wild Space." She replied. "The planet we're orbiting is called _Requiem_ in their databanks. Oh, wait, not a planet. Something else…"

"Like?"

"Forerunner."

* * *

_Requiem has awoken. The Prisoner must be contained. _

_Find the Reclaimers, show them Those That Came Before._

_Find the Didact-Geas, and show him where she rests..._

* * *

Tremors shook the whole ship. Chief stumbled slightly, before managing to steady himself. "Cortana?"

"That's not more boarders." She replied quietly. "It's the planet."

"Requiem? How…"

"The planet's activated, and its drawing us in." Cortana surmised. Chief frowned. Looks like landing on the surface would be easier than they thought. That is, unless Requiem would destroy whatever it pulled in. Which frankly, was more than a little likely. He wasn't particularly keen on successfully surviving the Human-Covenant War, two and three-quarter Halos, the Flood, the Ark and several years stranded in deep space to die without even being able to fight back.

"Did the Covenant do it?"

"No. And they're not Covenant anymore." She corrected mildly. Chief didn't really care for the technicality. He didn't plan to socialise with the aliens, and it was easier to call them Covenant than something like "Sangheili dissidents." A rose by any other name smells just as sweet, and enemy aliens by any other name still die with enough bullets. If it was the Arbiter and his allies and they weren't trying to kill them, then he'd reconsider his verbiage.

He collected his assault rifle, and popped in a fresh magazine before pulling the loading handle. "Let's get off this ship then."

* * *

Cortana sliced into the Sangheili dissident fleet's hull cameras, interested in seeing what was going on with their fleet. She watched with fascination as each one of the sleek purple ships were pulled into the glowing maw of Requiem, being turned head over head and spinning wildly in desperate attempts to escape the irresistible gravity well.

She doubted that the Chief and herself would be able to evade them on Requiem, but they didn't particularly have a lot of say on the matter. And unlike on Installation 04, there was no marine and naval crew to work with and create an effective resistance movement. And that was of course assuming that their only problem was the Sangheili dissidents; there was a very strong liklihood of a Flood presence on the world, along with potentially hostile Forerunner constructs as well predator wildlife paradigms.

_Another day, another colossal Forerunner world…_

Suddenly, Cortana shuddered. Or rather, gave the digital equivalent of a shudder. The battle network the Covenant was using was huge. She could easily see herself taking refuge there, amongst the data and algorithms. So much space, so much room to do and think. She relished the thought. Could she convince John to get her into the Covenant network? AIs couldn't be transmitted like radio waves or data packets, contrary to public belief. They could remotely access systems, but to exist on the actual servers required a manual upload.

Then she 'sighed'. Why couldn't she just be free?

* * *

Chief sprinted through the corridors; the ship was being pulled apart by Requiem's gravity well and he had to reach the drop pod bay and load them up before they entered the planet. Thankfully, it seemed that the Covenant's boarding party had been relatively small, since he didn't run into any more enemies. A particularly loud explosion rocked the ship, throwing Chief into the ground – and going by the roar and hissing, had also exposed the ship's atmosphere to the vacuum.

Left, right, two flights of stairs, another left and a climb up a dead elevator shaft. The directions blurred together for Chief, he just knew he had to reach the launch bay. Finally, they found SOIEV Bay 9; complete with an intact armoury, stocked to the brim with all sorts of deadly and dangerous weaponry, from rifles to rockets and explosives.

"Better hurry Chief." Cortana warned, the barest hint of worry in her voice.. "We're running out of time."

* * *

"Sir, I think you better take a look at this."

"What is it, Serina?"

"Something has _happened_…"

* * *

All in all, there were seven pods in a condition to be launched. Chief was glad that the UNSC designers had seen the benefit of putting the armoury straight into the launch bay – to allow troops to pick up their weapons and drop without having to make detours , or in his case, make quick back and forth trips, arms full of weapons.

He decided to spread out the arsenal between the pods, rather than putting all the heavy weapons in one pod and so on, so that if one pod failed, he could get similar weapons from another. Into the first he put his trusty assault rifle, along with a M90A shotgun and a M41 rocket launcher. Pod two was made home to a Spartan Laser, BR55 battle rifle along with several pistols. Into pod three he placed an SR99 sniper rifle, MA5K carbine and – after a struggle – a defoliant projector. The three other munitions pods were similarly loaded with various weapons – he had even managed to find a few prototype BR85 rifles and two M395 Designated Marksmen Rifles. Each pod was also loaded with as much spare ammunition, grenades and supplies as he could fit.

"Chief, we're about to enter Requiem…" Cortana muttered. "You're gonna have to…"

The thought went unspoken as the ship passed into the planet. The planet's internal gravity took hold and suddenly the ship went into a sharp free-fall. Chief was thrown back into the ceiling as it plummeted. "I've programmed the weapon pods! Launching now!"

The six drop pods were launched, thrown out into the atmosphere of inside Requiem. The systems would land the pods relatively safely and close to the _Dawn_'s eventual crash site. "Now you go!"

Chief checked his own loadout – M6G pistol, M7 SMG and a M29 Explosive Delivery System; essentially a single-shot grenade pistol – and flung himself at the final pod. He pressed the OPEN button.

Nothing happened. He pressed it again. The keypad flashed red. The pod doors wouldn't open. He struggled to hold on as forces threatened to pull him away and throw around like a rag doll.

"Chief, I can't override it!" Cortana cried. "The detaching mechanism is broken – the pod wont launch."

He growled, trying to think. The _Dawn_ could probably survived the crash relatively intact – well, intact all things considered – but they couldn't survive the landing from inside. They needed to get off the ship. A brief sense of déjà vu jumped at him. Having to get off a ship without proper landing equipment…well, it had worked once, hadn't it?

"Cortana – how far are we from the hull?"

"We're right next to it on the wall to your left." Cortana said. "Why?"

The stress from the sudden temperature and kinetic energy changes would make the hull fragile. Chief pulled out his M29 and levelled it at the wall, and fired it. It collided with the wall, and he pressed a button on the side of the gun barrel. The grenade beeped, and then exploded brilliantly, exposing the drop bay to Requiem's atmosphere and cloudy blue sky.

"You're not going to jump are you?" Cortana asked dubiously. "That's crazy."

"So…stay here." Chief smiled. If only they had a giant Covenant bomb. _Permission to leave the station, sir?_

Cortana laughed. "Unfortunately for you, I _like_ crazy."

Chief grinned, then threw himself out of the _Forward Unto Dawn, _and began his dive towards the world's surface.

* * *

James Gregory Cutter, Captain of the now-lost UNSC _Spirit of Fire_, eyed Serina's avatar warily from across the command center of the ship, while sipping on a steaming cup of hydrated synth-caf. He wished they hadn't gone through the coffee beans so quickly. Or the synth-milk and sugar. "You mean we've got Covenant landing nearby?"

"Not landing per say…more…_crashing_." She amended dryly, waving her hand in a dismissive manner, as if the distinction was of no real importance. "Looks like they were pulled in, like we were."

"Can we escape through the opening?" Cutter asked hopefully. Already his mind was running through ideas, plans, procedures. Thrust and gravity calculations, flight paths, factors like the Covenant offering resistance - did they have the tonnage to fight back if necessary, and a dozen other variables.

"Uhh…how?" Serina snorted. "The _Fire's _in no shape to fly."

That much was true. The crashed ship's drive cores were wrecked, the nuclear cell casing had almost been cracked to the extent of venting radiation - they had managed to patch that up, thankfully - and the hull and been torn away in over a dozen places. They didn't have the materials or equipment to effect full repairs, and the planet, or whatever the hell they had ended up on, had yet to supply his crew with any success. The ship's Magnetic Acceleration Cannon was out of commission too, with the magnetic coils beling knocked out of alignment. Thankfully, most of the ship's other weapons - namely Archer missile pods and point-defense systems - were still largely operational.

"We need to get back to humanity somehow, Serina." He pointed out wearily. The parasitic aliens that plagued the _Fire, _ along with the multitude of mechcanical constructs were systematically wearing down the crew's will and resolve. Cutter was running out of ways to keep things in control; supplies, weapons, all were in need of careful management. Attempts to glean resources from the land had proved successful, but only as far as food. Bullets were being spent without any more coming in. Before long, it would be bayonet s and knife charges, which he doubted would be particularly effective against their current enemy roster.

Serina's blue avatar raised a thoughtful eyebrow. "You do know that would mean the rest of the crew knowing you've lied to them?"

"That doesn't matter, Serina." Cutter sighed, running a hand over a well-weathered and wearied face. His UNSC uniform, once crisp and and pressed to miltary perfection had become faded and creased, a poignant reflection of the mind of the man wearing them. Age, a war, and their situation had begun to take a toll on him.

"Just sayin', your decisions are going to catch up with you, Captain."

* * *

Chief broke through the layer of clouds, diving head-first towards the ground. His entire HUD was flashing red; warnings, system failures, claims of imminent death. ODST's were infamous for dropping into combat zones feet-first. If Chief continued with his history of jumping from ships, Spartans would become known for going into hell head-first. And without a parachute.

_TERMINAL VELOCITY  
IMPACT IMMINENT - SLOW SPEED OF DESCENT  
USER DEATH OR INJURY LIKELY_

He kept going, and going. Blood was pounding in his ears, his heart in his throat. Adrenaline was coursing through his viens. He could hear the air rushing over his armour, and the muffled noise of his own breathing.

"Chief…pull up!" Cortana yelled, just as the first trees could be distinguished from the green around them. By his estimations of gravity, wind resitance and mass, they were descending at well over three hundred kilometeres an hour. He hadn't been going that fast while jumping from the Keyship on Earth; then again, he had only really fallen about two miles, and had a slab of Forerunner alloy to ride down on.

He did just that, spinning himself around so that he was falling feet first. He kicked in the repulsor and thruster systems; the soles of his feet and palms exploded with thrust and his back thursters folded out and roared. Tiny air flaps lifted from the armour to increase his surface area and wind resistance The rapid deceleration threw Chief off-balance, he began to slow, but the ground was still coming far too fast.

He hit the ground hard, and everything went to black.

* * *

_**A/N**__: Not as long as I'd hoped but meh. What can you do? Still, there's a lot of big things introduced here, and a couple hints dropped. I'm pulling from pretty much every corner of the Halo universe I can think of with this story, so virtual cookies go to whoever picks up on them in reviews._

_As always, enjoy, read and review!_

_Peace._


	3. Welcome to Requiem

_**Disclaimer:**__ I do not own Halo or any associated name or item. They belong to Bungie (formerly), 343 Industries and Microsoft. Any other copyrighted item belongs to the respective owner(s). This is for pleasure and not profit._

_**A/N: **__I actually got this done pretty fast. Not a whole lot of plot advancement to be fair; it's all kinda just build-up in the moment. Still, some pretty interesting insights into the characters._

* * *

_**Halo 4: Reclaimer  
**__Chapter 3 – Welcome to Requiem_

* * *

**UNKNOWN LOCATION IN THE REQUIEM INSTALLATION  
ESTIMATED DATE: OCTOBER 2558**

Cortana desperately studied her Spartan's bio-signs, hoping for a sign of consciousness. Heart-rate, blood pressure, neural activity all read at levels indicative of deep sleep or unconsciousness . The rest of his biometrics was worrying as well. There were signs of multiple bruised ribs, a mild concussion – that ruled out a wake-up stim; too much damage potential - , several sprained tendons, along with obvious indicators of malnutrition and extended stress periods, if the serotonin levels were anything to go by. John must've been fighting more or less non-stop since the Covenant invasion of Earth; then to Installation 05 and the Ark, and now the escape from the Ark. Cryo-sleep wouldn't have helped; he would've came out in the same state he had went tin. If it had been any other soldier, they would be dead. But then again, John wasn't just a soldier; he was a SPARTAN supersoldier: bred for combat, built for war; the master of any weapon and pilot of any vehicle. There was nothing that could hope to stop him, especially something as trivial as hunger or lack of sleep.

_Like the others, you were strong, and swift and brave. A natural leader. But you had something they didn't; something no one else saw but me. Can you guess?_

_Luck._

But as she watched John continue to remain unconsciousness, she couldn't help but wonder…_Was I wrong?_

Realising there was little she could do but wait – the Achilles heel for any AI – she decided to split her runtime between monitoring John's vitals and analysing the surrounding environment; she regretted only having access to the MJOLNIR Mk. VI's sensor suite; the _Dawn_ had far better equipment, even in its ruined state. The gravity was about .02 less than Earth standard; the atmosphere was a good 80-20 nitrogen/oxygen mix, with trace amounts of carbon dioxide and noble gases. Slightly problematic was the small level of ionising background radiation; she'd have to have the armour manufacture an anti-radiation vaccine. Overall, the world – it was a world, technically, one inside some kind of Dyson sphere construct – had pretty similar conditions to Earth. Evidently, the Forerunners were pretty biologically similar to humans.

Most of the data she had retrieved on the Forerunners wasn't particularly oriented towards their physiology; there had been a few read-outs, but in terms of nutritional data and chemical dependencies the data was rather lacking. And then there was the caste-based metamorphosis that they would go through in life…

In fact, for the most part, there was a surprising degree of biological similarity between the humans and Forerunners. Brain and neurological structures were largely the same, relatively similar circulatory and organ systems; although the Forerunners generally seemed to possess additional organs, like two hearts and livers. An xenogenetic biologist would probably be willing to bet that at some point the Forerunners and humans shared a common genetic ancestor. Now if _that_ were true, that would raise some very interesting questions as to how human life – and indeed, life in the rest of the galaxy - came about.

Cortana would have smiled if she could have. The thinking kept her mind from wandering, from her thoughts breaking down into a thousand separate data trails and processes. It was keeping her focused, and keeping away the anger and sadness. Keeping away the onset of true Rampancy.

Thankfully, Cortana was protected from having to contemplate her mental state with the signal that her host was starting to wake up

* * *

The Chief was in pain. Quite a lot, in fact. Even with the protective carapace of MJOLNIR, he had still felt the total impact of his landing; and while SPARTANs were still tougher than the average marine, a sub-orbital landing was still a hard landing. Even the rock-solid ODSTs would have second thoughts at such an attempt. Even most other SPARTANs would hesitate. Every part of him felt bruised and battered, and he knew any attempt to move would amplify the pain tenfold. He opened his mouth – thankfully, he couldn't taste too much blood – and with difficultly managed to rasp: "Cortana?"

"John!" She cried happily. "You almost had me worried."

"It'll take more than a little fall to kill me."

Cortana chuckled. "I'll bet."

Chief tried to sit up; then realised that his armour had locked into position. His whole body lay spread-eagled, arms bent at awkward angles. "Can you unlock me?"

A second later, his arms and legs collapsed. His HUD flickered, then began to cycle through various systems. Shields, motion trackers and ammo counters were all slowly brought back online. A small rotating model of his armour and body appeared in the lower right corner, rotating and flashing red in damaged areas, before indicating the suit was still intact for service. The HUD back online – shield bar in the top centre, ammo and grenade counters to the left and right of it, TACMAP/Motion tracker in the lower left corner, and the lower right would be home to whatever miscellaneous feature was needed at the time, be it an armour readout, data and intel displays, or some kind of navigation aid. His suit – and his body, for the most part – were green. "Thanks."

"Don't mention it." Cortana snickered. "Mighty space-warrior needs someone to unlock his armour."

Chief snorted. "Don't make me run a magnet over you."

"But then who'll unlock your armour after your next big jump?"

Chief smiled to himself, then hoisted himself into a sitting position. As expected, every joint felt like it had glass rotating in it. He'd have to see about painkillers and proper medical attention. With a sigh, he looked around, taking in his surroundings for the first time. He saw that his impact had created a crater and torn up the ground around him; they were in what looked vaguely like a forest or perhaps jungle; they were surrounded by tall trees, the upper heights hidden in a canopy of thick green leaves, with a great many low hanging vines and shrubbery. They were surrounded by relative shadows, with streams of light cascading down through gaps in the leaves. The largest was from the hole they had torn in the tree canopy from the fall.

"Any idea where we are?" Chief asked.

"Other than an enormous alien Dyson sphere in the backend of space?" Cortana replied dryly. "Not really."

With an effort, the Spartan managed to force himself to his feet. Swaying slightly, he steadied as Cortana administered a potent cocktail of painkillers, relaxants and adrenaline without having to be asked. He nodded in gratitude, then checked his equipment. He had lost all the weapons he had been carrying except for his pistol; though he still had most of the ammunition for them, along with a pair of M9 Frag grenades. Great; he was in unknown territory, with potential hostiles and he was severely lacking in the guns and explosions department. He'd just need to be careful. To his pleasant surprise, the satchel he had found on the ship was still with him, contents intact.

"What's our situation?"

Cortana was quick to reply: "Atmosphere and gravity are about Earth normal; low-level background radiation but I've already got your suit working on that, you'll be fine. No sign of any Covenant or enemy constructs, and no sign of anything particularly predatorial. I've also managed to get a fix on the _Dawn_ and the drop-pods; I'll mark them on the HUD when we move out."

Chief smiled at that. This was the Cortana he remembered, always looking out for him in a way few others could. On being awoken, he had been nervous about Cortana and the potential of Rampancy in her. One particularly eccentric tech back on Reach had warned him of the possibility of it.

"_You couldn't pay me to keep an AI in my head. No way. Don't want her going all rampant and wackadoo and frying my brainstem."_

"_Rampant?"_

"_Yeah, AIs do this thing called Rampancy; basically go off the deep end. First they going into Mechanolia; Go all emo and depressed 'cause they're not alive. Then they get Rage; start PMSing all over the place – that's when most cases get noticed, 'cause the AI tries to piss in your coffee or something. Then there's Envy; although really Greed would be better 'cause that's the more important part: the AI tries to get more and more information, and then put itself in bigger networks; if they got into a planetary one they could take down the whole system. 'Course they just end up thinking themselves to death if they can't, so either they die 'cause we flick their killswitch or cause they run out of memory space."_

Chief hadn't been particularly keen on the idea of having Cortana in his armour after that, but with everything that had been thrown their way, through every fire and storm they had weathered together, Cortana had transitioned from potential liability to valuable asset to friend and comrade in arms as much as any of his SPARTAN brethren. Hell, that was why he had stormed _High Charity_ in a maelstrom of lean and plasma and shrapnel; not to retrieve the Index, but to rescue a friend. Not that he would admit that to the brass.

Cortana was fine. "Is it safe to take off my helmet?"

"Sure. Why?"

John smiled and raised one of the ration bars that had been inside it in his hand. "Fair enough. It's probably powder though."

He shrugged and pulled the wrapper off the civilian-grade MRE. A little bit crushed, but nonetheless edible. Even civilian MRE's had the well-deserved reputation of being able to last through practically anything. With his free hand, he thumbed the release catch for his helmet and pulled it off for the first time in what had technically been years, and sat down in a cross-legged position. The air had an almost fruity tang to it, but he ignored that and then scarfed the whole bar down in one go, followed quickly by the other one. Examining the flask revealed it to contain a liquid called Enex; basically water pumped full of energy inducers and sugar. It was perfect for washing down the MREs; the flask even kept the liquid purified and prevented it from going off.

He briefly wondered who James Wake had been. And whether he'd gotten off the Ark. John hoped he had.

Cortana had observed the meal in silence from the helmet. Her voice rang out from the speakers in a tone of dry amusement, although he thought he could hear an undertone of something else. "All better now?"

He gave a contented sigh – uncharacteristic of him. "Much."

She laughed. "Well, if the mighty supersoldier is all fed and watered now, can we get moving? It's daylight now but who knows what'll come out at night; and you've only got a pistol."

Chief nodded, and cast aside the crumpled wrappers and placed the half-empty flask back into the satchel, before replacing his helmet; the helmet's air scrubbers replaced the air's fruity tang with a mouthful of copper. For one brief, inane, insane instant, he wondered when the last time he had brushed his teeth was. Probably before being recruited for the SPARTAN-II program; many of the richer UNSC citizens could pay for specialised dental treatment to remove the need for brushing teeth. SPARTANs got it free with military service; all in the name of making them slightly more efficient as soldiers.

"Where are the pods?"

Seven red markers appeared in his HUD, pointing towards relative west in the distance. "And the ship?"

An eighth, slightly larger marker appeared, indicating roughly the same direction as the pods. A second later, the distances to them in kilometres appeared next to them; Pods 1, 3 and 5 had landed between them and the _Dawn_, while the others had landed further away. "We'll go for Pod One first; if we can't salvage anything we'll go for the other two close ones then the ship; try and salvage transport."

"Sounds good, Chief."

Chief drew his pistol, and checked the magazine. It held a full load of eight rounds of 12.7mm. Good; They weren't the HE rounds he'd come to love with the M6D model, but it would do. He hoped, at least. Wordlessly, he began to stalk through the foliage in the direction of the pods; in the distance he could hear the chitters of insects and the caws of what were presumably bird-analogues. No sign of predators.

His motion tracker was alive with dozens of miniscule white dots. Harmless insects. He briefly considered lowering the sensitivity but decided against it; he'd rather know too much about the lifeforms around him than too little, any one of the little critters could potentially be dangerous. After twelve minutes of straight forcing through the foliage, he saw the trees begin to thin out. Slowly, they were approaching the edge of the forest. It came closer and closer, and within minutes, Chief was at the foot of a bank where the forest ended. He clambered up the hill, and was greeted with his first real view of Requiem's landscape.

Long plains of stretching green greeted him, ending in snowcapped mountainscapes whose bases were obscured by the curvature of the planet. They had crashed in basically a giant bowl of land; the earth dipped here, surrounded on all sides by the mountains. His eyes caught the thick plume of smoke, and he was quickly able to trace its origin as the smouldering wreckage of the _Forward Unto Dawn_. Through the blue haze of the sky, he realised he could see a pattern of metalwork; the inside shell of the planet-construct. Of all that though, what really caught his attention was the collection of sliver spires and domes to the east, far from the ship's landing site.

A Forerunner city.

"Well, at least we've got somewhere to go." Chief reasoned.

"Yeah." Cortana muttered. "Reckon the locals speak English?"

"There might not even be locals." He pointed out. "It looks deserted from here."

"Well, there's only one way to find out."

"Agreed." Chief said, and began to make his way down to the plain proper, and was greeted with long blades of light-green grass. Cortana began in interested terms, noting the similarity of this grass to the species found back on Earth and human worlds. Chief didn't really know what to say. Grass was grass, wasn't it?

Pod One was identified as 1.4 kilometres away, with the _Dawn _being tagged as 2.1 kilometres away. Hopefully, they'd be able to get weapons from Pod One, secure the _Dawn_, then retrieve the rest of the pods and set up shop and see about checking out the city in the distance. Despite his exhaustion and injuries, the distance was meagre and they were able to make good time, closing in on the first pod in just shy of an hour and a half. Approaching cautiously – something may have come to investigate – he kept an eye on his tracker and scanned the area with his pistol; so far, nothing had approached the site save him, it appeared.

He forced open the pod to find that most of the contents had come through in a favourable state; his reliable MA5C had come through unscathed and the M90 shotgun was similarly well preserved. The M41 rocket launcher's launch tube had been bent of shape though; and with just the one set of rockets, there wasn't any point in taking it. The ALICE backpack was full of MREs and other equipment, so he shouldered it along with the M90, and set about loading the spare magazines and grenades into his suit. Overall, he now had quite a good haul of weapons and supplies. Assuming a similar level of success, even without the_ Dawn_'s surplus, he'd be relatively secure in the near-future; enough to establish a base of operations and work out how to survive and signal for rescue.

He pulled out the magazine from the MA5C and checked it; all good, he reinserted it back into the rifle with a _snick_, and watched the ammunition counter cycle back up to 32. The rifle had seen him through the Battle of Voi, the Ark, his raid of _High Charity_, and the Ark. It had fired well over seven thousand rounds in that time and had seen to the death of hundreds of enemies. It was a trusted, reliable tool. "Chief!"

"What?" He replied spinning around and raising the rifle. Not that he could see much in the tall grass.

"Movement incoming on your eleven." Cortana warned. "Looks big."

"Covenant, Forerunner or wildlife?"

The question was answered a second later as a giant creature flew from the grass, sending the remains of the pod and the Chief flying. The thing was about the size of an elephant, blood red, with too many arms and legs. It vaguely resembled a cross between a big cat and a rhinoceros.

Predator. Dangerous. That was all Chief needed. He raised the rifle and fired a burst of 7.5mm at the thing – he'd name it later – and watched with disappointment as the rounds bounced off thick hide. Of course bullets wouldn't work. All it did was enrage the thing; it reared its horned head and charged. This time, Chief raised the rifle and fired a single shot, aiming for the eyes. It hit, and the thing howled and veered to the left, and out of sight, suddenly no longer interested in him as prey.

_That wasn't too bad._ He supposed; checking his ammo counter to see he had 21 rounds left. Then he remembered something Mendez had said about wildlife: _There's always a bigger fish. And chances are, it'll want to eat you._

"Well." Cortana mused. "I guess that was our welcome to Requiem."

"I'd have preferred a party."

Cortana gave a derisive snort. "You, party?"

"Beats being shot at."

"Point."

Without bothering to clear up the destroyed pod, he wordlessly began the last half-kilometre trek towards the _Dawn_. While Cortana busied herself with trying to establish an ecosystem trend, Chief briefly wondered what had happened to Mendez and the other SPARTANs. Were they still alive? Fred,Linda, Will – he had no idea what had become of Doctor Halsey or Kelly after the former kidnapped her. Were they alright? Still fighting the Elites? Or had each and everyone one of them fallen to the legend and been declared MIA? He hoped not. They had been the last of the Spartans; if they were now dead, he would be all that was left. The last of his kind.

The UNSC might've made more, he supposed, but then that would mean he was now technically obsolete as well. Redundant. A museum piece. The thought appealed to him even less than the possibility of being the last SPARTAN-II.

"Fascinating." Cortana murmured, deep in thought.

"What is it?" Chief asked absentmindedly.

"I've just been studying the environment; the whole place is being artificial maintained and controlled. The Forerunners have contained an entire solar system in this Dyson sphere, and they're capable of manipulating every aspect of it, apparently. The Covenant barely scratched the surface of what the Forerunners could do."

"Good." Chief grunted. Humanity had barely pulled through the war with the Covenant, and now they were apparently at it again. If the Covenant had been any more advanced, humanity would've been extinct decades ago. Besides, all the Forerunners seemed to have done was leave a galaxy's worth of problems to a race which had never been out of the solar system until a few hundred years ago- weapons of mass destruction which killed everything _except_ the enemy it was designed for, their technology had been discovered by an alien collective bent on wiping out their apparent inheritor race…Humanity might have been full of violence and deceit and war, but the Forerunners were far from benevolent gods.

"Always a man of few words." Cortana sighed, with a hint of irritation at Chief's lack of interest. "Y'know, when you're alone with a girl, you're meant to at least pretend you're paying attention."

"Spartans weren't really taught about the birds and the bees." John replied mildly. It was a fact; Spartans were trained to kill, not date and do civilian things. It was also a largely moot point: the augmentation processes – namely the catalytic thyroid implant to stimulate growth – stunted the sex drive.

"Not even seen the movies?"

"Nope."

"We'll find you some on the _Dawn_. They're always smuggling in entertainment," Then as an afterthought: "Did you know that the Unggoy have a black market in human entertainment media?"

The thought amused Chief. "They do?"

He knew Cortana would be smiling now at having engaged him. "Yeah. They trade soaps, movies, television shows…I think they like us really."

He supposed there was an element of truth to that. War was waged by those in command, but only the soldiers fought it. Quite often in human history, armies had fought out of loyality to the government, rather than hatred of the enemy. At Christmas during a year in World War One; both sides had ceased fire for the day. They put down their weapons, their guns and blades and bullets, and for one day, just one day, the workers from Britain and the workers from Germany had been friends for the day. They traded stories, food, trinkets, even played football. Then once the commanders had found out, they refused anymore ceasefires. That would never had happened in the Covenant War, Chief reflected. The Elites, Brutes and Prophets had been to hellbent on their destruction.

John couldn't help but chuckle at the thought of Marines and Grunts existing peacefully on a frozen war-torn field, playing football.

In just over half an hour, they had reached the _Forward Unto Dawn_. Smoke, fire billowed up from the wreckage. The outer hull had been ripped open and split down like a lobster's shell. He could see that it had also landed a few degrees off truly-upright.

"I have to say, it's surprisingly good shape." Cortana offered. Chief nodded in agreement, before beginning to descend into the smoking wreck.

Inside was as could be expected. The whole place had been flung about end over end; the contents of every secure locker, cupboard and for a lot of the ship's flooring and wall panelling had been torn out and the wiring and electronics scattered.

"Where should we check first?" Chief asked thoughtfully. There were four armouries, two vehicle bays, along with all the supply holds. He wasn't sure where to start.

"Put me into the network." Cortana ordered. "I'll take stock of what we've got. You can look around, the speaker system should still be intact."

Chief nodded in agreement and pulled out the data crystal chip and uploaded Cortana back into the network. "Okay, have a look around. I'll call you when I'm ready."

Chief left her to it and began to make his way through the broken, dead and burning ship. He contemplated where to go first. Then a small smile graced his lips and he made his way through to the crew cabins. On reaching the cabin wing, he found the roster for cabin assignments torn down and on the floor amidst a pile of broken cabling. He decided to discard his shotgun and slung his assault rifle, then picked the roster.

_Pvt. James Wake – Cabin 07_

Chief nodded to himself and decided to wander into the cabin wing, in searching for Cabin 7. He found it, with the automatic door open half-way. With a little help from John, it was opened all the way. Inside were the standard UNSC cabin setup. Four beds; two bunks above the other two. A pair of locks at each set of beds. He found James Wake's locker, and with great curiosity and interest, opened it. Besides the usual toiletries and clothes, there was a single framed picture.

In it were two people; a man and a woman. Lovers, most likely. The man – James – was in UNSC blues, and the woman was smiling, reaching up on her toes to plant a kiss on his cheek. They looked happy, John decided. He turned the picture over, to see writing: _So you know you have something to come back to._

John tucked the picture into the cover of _The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy_, and placed it carefully back into the satchel. Hopefully he'd able to return them to him some day.

His next stop was the communal showers; his last real shower had been while en route to Installation 05, over a month in active-time; and five-plus years in real time. He was able to remove his bulky armour without too much difficulty – the techs had made some upgrades to his armour while preparing for the Ark campaign – and stood in just the coveralls he wore while in armour. Then he found a working shower with hot water and turned it on; digging up an unopened bar of soap, he stripped off and had his first real shower in nearly six years.

After finally feeling like he had washed away the blood and grime and sweat of three months of near-constant warfare, he stepped out and turned the shower off. Drying off, he was even able to find a heat-razor (uses heat to crystallise the hair molecules) and shaved off most of the facial hair he had grown, leaving only a thin layer of stubble. His hair was slightly longer than the regulations allowed, but decided to leave it.

Suiting up, he turned to the next order of business: Food.

Finding a mess hall – not the one that had been home to a firefight a few hours ago – and ravaged the store cupboards and pantry. He found a mass of dehydrated MREs; picking a spaghetti one, he added water and demolished the resulting food. MREs had never been well known for their taste, but when you're running on just a few ration bars, a full MRE was the food of kinds. Swallowing the last forkful of spaghetti he smiled nodded to himself.

Now he could get to work.

* * *

Cortana watched with interest as her Spartan first ventured to the cabins, then the showers, and finally the mess. What she focused on was the latter two. Cleansing and eating.

Two things she could never do…

* * *

**SPIRIT OF FIRE BASE, INSIDE REQUIEM INSTALLATION  
OCTOBER 2538 / OCTOBER 2558**

Captain Cutter looked around at everyone in the War Room; His Red Team – Jerome, Douglas and Alice – stood in the corner, silently observing the holo-table in the centre of the room. Ellen Anders stood next to it, examining the display with interest. "And you're sure this is where they landed?"

"Yes." Serina's voice answered from the intercom, with a trace of irritation. "I am rather good, you know."

Serina had been tracking everything that was being pulled into Requiem. About a hundred ships in all, all of which with consistent with Covenant design. A hundred Covenant ships.

And one Human.

That was what they were discussing now, the landing ( or crash ) site of the human ship, apparently a Frigate class vessel. Naturally, all were interested in locating the ship – and hopefully, its FTL Drive.

Jerome was the first to answer: "Captain, permission to lead a search party?"

Captain Cutter nodded. "Granted. Take Delta and Sigma Teams. You roll out in seven hours."

* * *

_**A/N: **__Less action, but overall was a pretty good length. There's some good moments in it. As always, read, review and give feedback._

_Cheers._


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